Cambridge English Starters TEST

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YLE Starters Reading & Writing Part 3 – Teacher’s Notes

Description

This activity gives students practice in spelling words when the letters of the words are given.

Time required:

10–15 minutes.

Materials required:

YLE Starters Sample Paper downloaded from the Cambridge English

website the Cambridge English website.

Please download the Sample Paper for this lesson.

Aims: to introduce students to Part 3 of Starters Reading and Writing paper and to the

task type

to encourage close observation.

Procedure

Note: No pictures are used in this class activity. However, in the test, pictures are always used (see Sample Task).

1. Set up the activity

Select six words from the same topic. These should be words which the students already

know.

Check that the words are on the Starters vocabulary list. (See the Cambridge English:

Young Learners Handbook.) Make sure the words are varied in length.

For example:

If you choose words from the topic FOOD – chicken, grape, sausage, bread, potato, lemon.

On the board draw a small circle for each word and write the letters in jumbled order inside

each circle.

For example:

Number the circles 1–6.

2. Introduce the activity

L N E O M

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Do one example with the class.

If they have no idea what they word is, give them a clue by telling them the topic that the word is

from.

Ask a student to come and write the word correctly under the circle. Elicit what the word family is.

Write this at the top of the board.

3. Complete the activity

Put students into pairs.

They decode the other words and write them on a piece of paper.

It’s important that children get used to writing their answers clearly, so that in the test they

are easy to understand (it’s best if they print words rather than use joined-up writing).

Pairs swap papers with another pair. They should keep their course books and vocabulary books

closed.

4. Checking answers

Elicit the answers for circles 2–5 from the class and write each word under its circle.

Ask students to spell out the word for you to write it. You could quickly revise some spelling

patterns in English.

For example:

ck for the /k/ sound in the middle and at the end of words, e.g. chicken, sock

the vowel-consonant-e pattern, as in grape, bike

g-e (to change g from hard to soft), as in sausage, orange

ch, /ʧ /, as in chicken, chips.

In pairs, children now check the work of the students they swapped

papers with. Remind students that they are checking for correct spelling

and for clearly written letters.

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5. Sample Task

Hand out a copy of the Sample Task to each student.

Ask students what extra help they have in the task to help them with the exercise. Answer

– the pictures.

Look at the example with the students. Ask why there are dashes/lines _ _ _ on the page.

Answer – one dash is for each letter.

This is to encourage children to print their answers and to make sure they use all the

letters that are given

Remind students to read the instructions and to think about the spelling of each word

carefully.

Give them 3–5 minutes to do the task.

For the Reading & Writing test, it’s important to train students to get used to a

limited amount of time for each part, as in the test they need to manage the time

themselves.

Check answers with the class.

6. Important information to give to the students

At the end of the activity, tell students that in the test:

they must not leave any answers blank. If they are not sure of an answer at the end of the

test, they should guess at spelling the word. They may be right and they won’t lose any

marks for a wrong answer.

Suggested follow-up activities

Ask students to work in pairs and choose another topic/word family, e.g. animals / the

home / school. They should choose 6 words from this topic and draw circles with the words

jumbled up just as the teacher did on the board. They then give these circles to another

pair to see if they can spell the words from the circles correctly.

The teacher can repeat Steps 1–4 of this lesson plan to revise vocabulary at the start/end

of lessons.

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YLE Starters Reading & Writing Part 3 – Answer Key

Key to Sample Task 1

1. jeans

2. shoes

3. jacket

4. handbag

5. trousers

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YLE Starters Reading & Writing Part 3 – Sample Task

Original can be found on Page 17 of YLE Starters Reading & Writing Sample Paper, which can be downloaded from the Cambridge English website.